


Fragments

by teaspoon82



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: F/M, M/M, PTSD, Tarsus IV
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-01-02
Updated: 2011-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-14 08:53:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/147537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teaspoon82/pseuds/teaspoon82
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Watching the planet of Tarsus IV come into view, James Kirk has no knowledge of what is to come.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Damaged at Best

**Author's Note:**

> I know that my descriptions of Tarsus IV and Kotos don’t agree with the information given in “The Conscience of the King” (Star Trek Original Series), but I wrote it before I re-watched the episode, and then decided that it would sound weird if I changed what I had written. In order to explain the differences, I’m going with the “it’s an alternate universe” thing, so events could have happened differently.
> 
> Posted under a different name on ff.net

When Winona Kirk receives the call from Iowa about Jim, her heart almost stops in its shock. The shock is all too quickly replaced by terror: what if he had jumped a second later, what if he had meant to not jump at all? Vividly recalling the hatred on his young face on the day of her second marriage, she sends a message to her sister; she cannot be on Earth to take care of her son, and she doesn’t trust Jimmy to let his step-father take care of him. Two days later, Winona lands in Iowa. Three days later, Jimmy is leaving for space.

*

Watching the planet of Tarsus IV come into view, James Kirk has no knowledge of what is to come. He doesn’t know that the small spots of desert on this green and blue world will expand. He doesn’t know that at that moment, a young lieutenant in the army is making friends and gathering followers. He doesn’t know that the kind-faced woman who introduces herself as his aunt will be dead in less than a year, her quiet husband with her. All James Kirk knows is that his mother would rather search the sky for something she can never find than love him.

*

James Kirk sits quietly with his young cousins in the hospital’s waiting room. He watches as the twins examine the small bandages on their arms from the blood test, the only test they had endured. His aunt and uncle return from two different wings within a few minutes of each other. He notes the matching sweaty foreheads, so like his own. On the drive back to their home, the Jim and the two adults sit perfectly still and quiet, while his cousins chatter. When they reach the house, Jim retreats to his bedroom and sobs into his pillow. That was not what a doctor’s appointment was supposed to be.

*

Blood, silenced screams, unanswered prayers. This is what brings James T. Kirk into adulthood: a shared knowledge of the thousands of people that no longer breathe. He breathes shallowly, hoping to avoid the stench of the gaping, open graves. His eyes dart around the abandoned streets. He grasps the food that will need to last his home at least two weeks: half a chicken and half a loaf of  
replicated, moldy bread, a good load for five, six including himself. He thinks of the youngest, her hollow eyes stuck in his mind. Only five, he decides; he can go another two weeks on crumbs.

*

Subject 2445 didn’t lose his humanity when he allowed the soldiers into his aunt’s home; he had known, and his aunt and uncle had known, that he would take care of the young children. His humanity had remained as he watched the only people who treated him like a son be systematically exterminated. It began to fray as he watched while his cousins became painfully thin. As he held their small, ill bodies, small pieces of himself began to fall away. Subject 2445 kept his humanity as he strangled a boy no older than himself for a chunk of just edible meat, and as he did nothing to stop the destruction of his home.

*

Subject 2445 lay curled in the ruins of a house. His last cousin had died the week before. Five tiny graves lay nestled in the corner of the hovel. Military-grade phasers sounded from every corner of the small colony. Subject 2445 whimpered and pressed his hands over his ears. An early model of a tricorder scanned the area for life. The small machine did not surprise any member of the platoon when it announced the presence of a life form close to their location. However, the shock of finding a survivor of the planet’s genocide and the following famine, and not a soldier, almost killed the commanding officer.

*

Of the three thousand to survive the initial genocide, James Kirk is one of only twelve to make it off Tarsus IV with their lives, and one of five to make it with some semblance of sanity. When he calmed down enough, Subject 2445 let the soldiers of Starfleet take him off the planet and provide him with food and clothing. With a doctor on hand to sedate him if necessary, they tell him these figures. James Kirk sits quietly for a minute then asks for a pen and paper. He calmly writes these numbers down, places the paper in his pocket, and returns to his room. Despite persuasions and threats, the paper never leaves the pocket of his clothing.

*

Instead of trying to deal with her (then) almost fourteen-year-old son, Winona Kirk shipped him off to her sister on Tarsus IV. He didn’t look back as the shuttle went off world, furious expression and too-long hair hiding tear-filled eyes.  
Almost three years later, staring at the emaciated teenager who used to be her son, looking into once bright blue eyes, she finds one more reason to hate herself.  
When she leaves him in the care of the government and drives away from their dusty Iowa home a month later for another Starfleet mission, she ignores the fact that no eyes follow the retreating car.

*

James Kirk has undergone three months of physical and psychological rehabilitation, but nothing yet has felt as good as it did when he look his first night free, went to a seedy bar, and got into a fight with the meanest and ugliest looking men there. From then on, the doctors and government officials restrict any unsupervised trips away from the military base. He never tells the balding doctor with round glasses barely perched on his nose that he wishes he would black out; when he wakes up it all might just have been a nightmare his fucked up, space-born mind created.

*

The second time James Kirk leaves the military base, he decides that he wants to try sex. Since alcohol and pain seem so effective at helping him forget, he wants to see if any less destructive form of iniquity will work as well. While it was a wonderful experience – aside from the fact that the girl underneath him had a boyfriend who wrenched the car door open in the middle, quickly followed by a number of James’ military guard, as well as some of the bar’s more curious patrons – it didn’t work as well as he had anticipated. However, he thought with a smirk as he was driven back to the base, that didn’t mean he couldn’t try it a few more times, just to be sure.

*

After three years of individual care, James Kirk knows enough to tell the doctors that he despises them simply because they are, with the exception of the other survivors, the only people he has seen in all that time. It is a story he sticks to for so many years that he hopes one day to believe it himself. He refuses to admit that he doesn’t trust a single one of them not to cut open his abdomen and examine his organs. He would, however, trust them to use more than a light anesthetic when they did so.

*

James Kirk is released from government custody not a day before the government doctors declare him fit for society. He sits at a small diner on the border of Oklahoma and Kansas, the slip of paper with the numbers 3,000, 12, and, 5 written on it sitting on the table in from of him. He is nineteen and he sips the non-regulation, non-replicated coffee with reverence. Noting the frail, soft edges of the paper, Subject 2445 comes to a decision. Leaving money on the table, he exits the dinner and heads to the nearest town. He has enough money from the government to buy enough ink for a few numbers.

*

James rubs his fingers against the numbers on his forearm. Above the three numbers from his original piece of paper, the number 2445 resides. Some might consider the very idea of his tattoo sickening, even degrading. But to him, it’s a reminder of two facts: how truly fucking lucky he is, and the exact depths to which he is capable of sinking. The tattoo earns him many odd looks in the next few years, along with a number of inane questions about the its meaning. He smiles and easily evades all inquiries.

*

If Tarsus IV taught Jim anything, it was to live abstemiously – and not just in relation to food. Aside from an occasional bender, the only thing Jim allowed himself to indulge in was physical contact. After years of hugging the filthy and entirely clothed bodies of his cousins, the feeling of clean, slick skin sliding against his was something he never got tired of. Sex was never about gender or love, only having his skin next to someone else’s.

*

Jim’s devil-may-care attitude is not an act. He is, generally, a happy individual. He is content with his life: drinking, flirting, and brawling. When Captain Pike appears and challenges him, he brushes it off. Two hours later, rubbing his tattoo, Jim lets Pike win. Subject 2445 pokes its head out of a dark corner. Defend and protect, Subject 2445 hears. Explore and shine, Jim hears. Thinking of how easily the lieutenant on Tarsus IV could have been prevented in the early weeks, James Kirk mounts his bike and drives to the shipyard. ‘Maybe,’ says a voice in his head, ‘this might be enough for mom to – ’. He cuts off the voice. This will never be about her; it’s about that gleaming ship being dry-docked, and all the things that they might accomplish together.

*

When he boards the Starfleet shuttle, Jim spares a thought that he should be terrified at getting into another small ship removing him from Iowa. When an unshaven man with whiskey on his breath is herded out of the bathroom hollering about aviaphobia, Jim realizes that he had never been more comfortable. Without Starfleet, he would never have gotten off that fucking planet. Jim is undecided on his opinion of this man, but when he shares the expensive smelling alcohol with Jim, Jim decides that a friend could be a good thing, even one as odd as Leonard McCoy.

*

The first time he hit on Uhura, Jim thought he might have made some headway with their brief conversation on Xenolinguistics. Her eye roll on the shuttle the next day proved this assumption entirely wrong, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t try. The second time he hit on her, Bones smirked as she coolly informed him that he was a better flirt when he was totally shit-faced. The third time Jim hit on Uhura – he really needed to find out what her first name was – he made sure they were at a bar and he was shit-faced. She listened to him for ten seconds, laughed, and walked away.

*

He is used to charming people into making them like him despite his careless, and sometimes abrasive, attitude. What isn’t easy is discovering that Bones doesn’t seem to fall for his natural blend of charisma. They are friends – Jim would dare to say best friends – and Bones doesn’t give a shit when Jim uses every trick he knows to try to get out of doing something (and then insists he can’t put up with anything anymore). Bones just snorts, says, “Don’t be so dramatic,” and ignores him. For someone who had every movement and word analyzed for three years, the change is startlingly refreshing. (Then there are days when they both know not to say a single word to one another).

*

The only one smart enough not to ask what the tattoo means is an unkempt doctor. Jim Kirk sometimes sees the Southern man looking at the numbers with confusion, trying to place why his mind knows that set of numbers. Whenever Jim sees the look, he smiles wistfully and rubs the tattoo. The movement always distracts Bones, who shakes his head and returns to his books. They both have their own set of secrets, but while Bones might let a few slip here and there, Tarsus IV is something Bones would have to figure out without any prompting from Jim.

*

When Bones asks Jim to meet him outside the medical building on Starfleet’s campus, Jim doesn’t mind; everyone needs some vaccination or another. When he sees Bones exit the building surrounded by younger cadets asking him questions, he is curious, but not concerned. But when Bones reaches him, and Jim can hear the last few cadets depart with, “Thanks, Dr. McCoy,” and, “Wonderful lecture, Doctor,” his lunch almost lands on Leonard McCoy – Doctor Leonard McCoy’s shoes.

He sprints away from the confused doctor, heading full tilt to his room. He locks the door to the little personal bathroom and heaves. He had slept in the same room with McCoy. Flashes of blank faced men with a scalpels appear behind his eyes. He hears McCoy banging on the bathroom door and heaves again. With shaking hands, he pulls a small box out of his pocket. The doctors at the military base told him to take it only under situations of extreme distress and anxiety. He tosses two of the small green pills down his throat and swallowes as fast as he can. He regulates his breathing, and summons every memory he has of Bones before the doctor fiasco. He stands up, shaking slightly and splashes water on his face. With the drugs in his system, he brushes his teeth, and opens the door. Bones sits on his bed, scowling. “Wanna tell me what the hell that was about?” he growls. Jim grins, the drugs making him calm, “Nothing, just remembered that I forgot to brush my pretty pearl whites.”

“The astounding number of fights you get into, it’s a wonder you even have teeth anymore,” Bones buys the lie, familiar with Jim’s bouts of vanity. “Which bar do I have to keep you from killing yourself in tonight?” the Doctor sighs.

“No bars tonight, Bones. Tonight, I’m gonna drink myself sick in the comfort of my very own room,” Jim replies, not really sure if he should drink with the little green babies in his system, but not really sure if he truly cares. He knows that if he goes to a bar with Bones tonight, he’ll either end up punching him, or telling him everything. James Kirk can’t decide which he dreads more.

*

It takes Subject 2445 months before it’s comfortable going to sleep in the same room as the Doctor. It requests and receives a hypospray from the Doctors in Oklahoma in less than 24 hours. Jim sleeps with the chemicals capable of knocking out a horse under his pillow. The military Doctors don’t even ask why the Starfleet cadet needs the drugs; they have the Academy’s room assignments, and the other eleven survivors have told them enough for them to understand Subject 2445’s hatred of Doctors.

*

The first time Bones sees Jim without a shirt on, he freezes. The scars that litter Jim’s torso might not be understood by anyone without a medical degree, but Bones had gone to med school, and he knows how to identify scars. Jim’s scars are a combination of badly done dermal regenerations, small knives, and human teeth. They are old and slightly shiny.

There is one scar that most would assume was simply an odd birthmark, but Bones knows better; it is an Old-Earth bullet wound. The scar is present only on the back of his shoulder, indicating a that the bullet didn’t go all the way through, that someone had to have pulled it out. Bones winces at the imagined pain of it all. He refuses to form suspicions; they’ll only cloud his judgment. For now, he’ll ignore the marks of a horrific past, and wait for Jim to trust him enough to tell him.

*

Jim was a bit shaky as he entered his Modern Atrocities class – he never was quite sure why he took it – on a particular Wednesday. He was only slightly nauseous, but confidant that he would survive the next two days. How the class had reached Tarsus IV was a mystery to him, but he was determined to get through the subject. He survived the first day by taking as many notes as he could, ignoring the odd looks Bones sent him or the queasy expressions of many of his classmates. When he entered the lecture hall the next day, he cursed himself for not actually paying attention. Standing at the front of the room with two military looking security guards, was Subject 731. Subject 2445 froze, panicked that 731 would acknowledge him. Jim sat as far back as the room would allow, Bones next to him. When 731 started talking, Jim took no notes. He sat, breathing as steadily as he could, as the horror that had been his life came pouring out of 731. He only noticed the three reporters at the front of the room halfway through the allotted time. It was all he could do to keep breathing; this was the first time that a personal account was being given to the public, no holds bared. When 731 finished, one of her guards escorted the press out, and the cadets filed quietly out of the room. Jim was last. He made sure that only 731 and her guard were in the room – he had told Bones to go on ahead – and then he approached her. Her eyes lit up in recognition. “2445!” she exclaimed, “James! What are you doing here?” He glanced pointedly at his red uniform. “Oh, of course, silly me. Why else would you be here?”

“731, Amy, if you had been speaking somewhere else, and I had known, no frigging regulations could stop me from coming,” Jim looked directly at her. He knew this woman; knew things about her that no one else could know. He knew because he knew the same things about himself. She smiled brightly and held out her hand. Jim took it and gently squeezed it. It was the closest to a hug she ever gave anyone.

“So, still with the government?” Jim asked.

“Only if I’m talking with people that know about me. People who don’t know that I was on Tarsus IV don’t scare me at all,” she paused, and then continued, “You seem to be assimilating well.”

Jim chuckled, “No one knows, and no on needs to. You get my meaning?”

Amy nodded, slightly shamefaced, “James, I didn’t mean to mess anything up by coming here, I just – ”

“I know Amy, people should know what happened, not just the rosy, government-fed bits. Just, do you think you could maybe, not recognize me if the need calls for it?”

She smiled again, “James Tiberius Kirk, it will be my honor to ignore you.” The guard cleared his throat. “Oh, drat! Sorry James, but duty calls.” 

“You’re doing more?” Jim choked out.

“I do five a year for the next five years and the government pays me a lot of money to find a nice little house in a small country town. It’s what I want, to forget any of this really happened,” Amy replied. “What about you, you still have that tatty piece of paper? We never did know what was on it.”

Jim rolled up his left sleeve, “This was what the paper had on it.”

She reads them and nods in recognition. She taps the side of her head, “They’re stuck in here. Can’t ever get them out.” Amy smiles, “But you did always prefer visual aids.” Jim and Amy share a laugh before the guard clears his throat more pointedly. Amy sighs. “Sorry James, but I really do need to go. I’ll keep you updated with my numbers so you don’t have an excuse to avoid me.” She squeezes his  
hand and heads to the door.

“Bye Amy, 731.”

“Bye James, 2445.”

When Jim returns to the room he shares with Bones, he deposits bags full of food and booze. “Snack and study, best way to learn,” he announces. Bones mutters something that Jim is sure is insulting before sorting through the bags and taking a good portion of the random purchases to his desk.

“Don’t think this means I didn’t notice how weird you’ve been acting Jim,” Bones remarks before pretending that nothing happened.

James dreads the day that Bones actively starts questioning his odd habits.

*

For a few weeks after the class finishes studying Tarsus IV, Jim is very careful not to let Bones see his tattoo. In fact, his paranoia that anyone from his class will recognize the significance of the numbers is so intense that he refuses to wear anything but long sleeve shirts. Bones enters their room sweating from the California spring and immediately starts shivering. “Jim, what the hell!” he exclaims, “Goddammit, man, it’s spring! I know you own t-shirts. Wear them!”

Two days later the thermostat is back to normal. It has been three months since the test; James doesn’t want to seem too crazy.

*

“Bones! Earth to Bones! Regain consciousness!” Jim stands on the end of Bones’ bed, gently bouncing.

Bones moans and turns over, eyes squinting against the light streaming in through the windows. Light that catches on a head of red hair sitting on the floor next to his bed. “Wha-,” he manages to croak out.

“Bones, wake up, we gotta go. The sun will not wait for you,” Jim responds. Bones slowly sits up, knowing that Jim won’t leave him alone until he gets what he wants. He crushes the palms of his hands into his eyes. He removes them to find a face much too close to his.

“Are you sure he’s a doctor?” the face questions.

“Yup, but he’s safe, no worries Amy,” he hears Jim respond.

“Well, if you’re sure he’s okay,” the face seems to decide. “I’m Amy,” it tells him.

“From the seminar. On Tarsus IV. Jim, what the hell is she doing in our room at”, he checked the clock, “seven in the morning?”

“Got plans Bones, you need to get up, good things happening,” Jim informs him. “We’ll be right here, go take a shower.”

Still not conscious, Bones is herded into the tiny bathroom and directed to the shower.

Amy turned to Jim. “James,” she began, “I need to make sure that this guy is okay.”

“I already told you, he’s safe,” Jim insisted. “I’ve slept in the same room with him for a year.”

“With narcotics powerful enough to put an elephant into a coma under your pillow?” she questioned. At his confused face, she said, “You were occupied, I was bored, the pillow was the closest thing I could pick up.”

“So I’m paranoid. It’s not like I don’t have a reason.”

“I know Jim. I know how you feel about doctors. By the time they got to you, they were running out of anesthetic. I got a full dose and it was barely enough. I just need to make sure that you’re really okay with this,” Amy said, concern tugging her eyebrows down. “This guy is for life, no whoops, bad call. You’re friends, and you will be until, well, until you’re dead.”

Jim just raised his eyebrows at her. “Amy,” he began slowly, “I don’t think you’ve known Bones long enough to know something like that.”

“My intuition was the only thing that kept me alive 2445, I know what I’m talking about,” 731 said bitterly.

Jim nodded, not responding. Bones emerged from the bathroom, dressed in civvies and toweling his hair dry. ”Just what was so damn important that I had to wake up at the crack of frigging dawn?”

“Interplanetary food fair in the city. Bones, I’ve been talking about this for weeks,” Jim said.

“Fine. But I am not paying for your food.”

The day was perfectly sunny. Jim and Amy ate anything they could get their hands on, and Bones only ate the food if he could tell what it was. There was a curling feeling of contentment in the air, one that Jim hadn’t felt since before the sand covered Tarsus IV.

*

After two years at the academy, Jim is starting to crack. When he hears Uhura talking about ‘How awful Tarsus IV must have been,’ and, ‘can you even imagine what it was like living there,’ Jim almost goes up to her and tells her. Five steps away from her, he realized what he was doing. He turned and ran for the closest bar. He drank enough that the pudgy, middle-aged male barman began to look attractive.

He couldn’t believe what he had almost done. If he told, the government would probably lock him back up, and there would only be four sane survivors. He is distinctly cooler to Uhura after that incident.

*

After the sunny day of the food fair, during which Amy had subtly nodded her approval of Bones, Jim allows Bones to actually help him if he’s sick. A year ago, he would have glared if Bones even thought the words Jim and hypospray in the same sentence. But they’ve slept in the same room for years and Jim doesn’t have a scratch on him, so during September of their third year together, when Jim contracts a terrible case of influenza, he only lasts a day before he asks Bones to help him.

*

Bones knows that Jim Kirk will eat just about anything as long as it’s fresh. Knowing this, Bones is undeniably shocked when he steals a bite of Jim’s sandwich and promptly spits it back out. “Jim, do you have any idea how stale this bread is?” Bones demands.

Jim nods. “I like it like that,” he says, “fresh bread tastes kinda weird.” Jim doesn’t tell Bones that to him, the ‘stale bread’ is fresh. He can’t stand the stuff right when it comes out of the oven, it’s always warm and soft. Of all the odd residual habits Jim has left over form Tarsus IV, this is the one that he never gets over.

*

Tapping his desk impatiently, Jim waits for his call to be answered. There is a click and Amy’s wide face fills the screen. “Hey Jim, what’s – ”.

“Are you the only one?” Jim interrupts her.

Automatically knowing what he’s talking about, Amy sighs. “No Jim,” she says, “the other three as well. We’ve all made a similar deal.”

“Why didn’t they ask me?” he asks.

“You joined Starfleet Jim, you made a life for yourself that would put you in contact with a lot of people. You could be a Captain some day. Do you want to wonder if it was given out of pity? Or do you want to know that you earned it?” She sighed then continued, “The government isn’t cruel here Jim. They actually want to help us. Take comfort in the fact that they are actually giving us the choice of making lives for ourselves. None of us are forced to talk; we chose to tell people and in return, we never have to worry about how we’re going to find food for the rest of our lives. That was the only thing I thought about for two years. I never want to think about it again.” She rubbed her forehead as if she was tired.

“You’re my friend Jim, and I love you, but it’s two in the morning here, do you think we could talk while I’m actually awake?”

“Sure, no problem. Oh, and Amy.”

“Yeah Jim.”

“Thanks.”

Amy smiled. “You’re welcome Jim. Night”

“Goodnight.”

*

After a particularly bad session of combat training, Jim sits on his bed, letting Bones fix his three fractured ribs. As he finishes, Bones cannot stop himself from gently touching the bullet scar. Very aware that he was stepping out of their established boundaries, Bones quietly asked, “Who pulled out the bullet, Jim?”

More resigned than surprised, Jim responds, “I did, Bones,” before pulling his shirt over his scarred torso and lying down to sleep.

Recognizing the depth of trust Jim displayed in telling him that, Bones doesn’t press for any more information.


	2. Dragged Across the Ground

Jim brought Bones to a random bar in the hopes that it would distract him from thinking too much about the date. Jim apparently misses something during his trip to the bathroom because when he returns, he finds Bones surrounded by a bunch of idiots. When he sees one of the large men lean in towards Bones, Jim doesn’t think; he simply reacts. When he takes the punch that was meant for Bones, he knows that he’s gotten in way too deep. He hasn’t taken a beating for anyone since his cousins died.

But seeing the look of annoyance on Bones’s face (which really translates to concern) he realizes that it was the best thing he could have done for Bones. If he’s worried about patching up Jim, he won’t remember that his little girl is turning four without her daddy there.

*

After days that have been particularly hard, Jim wakes up from nightmares of scorched flesh and food falling through his fingers like sand. He breathes hard, in through the nose, out through the mouth. Every time, he is positive that the small gasping noises he makes will wake up Bones, but the older man never seems to stir.

Every two and a half weeks, when Jim wakes up, gasping for air, from another nightmare, Bones holds himself very still, waiting to see if Jim will call out to him. Jim never does. Bones never goes back to sleep until he hears Jim’s breath become quiet and even once more.

*

Sitting in the simulator room, looking at the anger and terror that vied for room on Jim’s face, Bones cursed the idiots who not only conceived the Kobayashi Maru test, but who also thought, somewhere in their obviously tiny skulls, that it would be a clever idea to have made the test available to Jim Kirk.

Two months later, when Jim announces that he’s taking the test again, Bones is tempted to lock Jim in their room until he regains his mind. The second time is only slightly better than the first. At least this time, Jim expects the rise of bile in his throat, and Bones knows to have the toilet clean and bottles of good Southern Bourbon waiting back at the room.

*

Jim Kirk meets Gaila on a Thursday. He bashes into her with a large stack of paper books precariously balanced in his arms. She and the male cadet holding her hand fall into a large tangle with Jim. His stomach tightens when she laughs brightly, saying, “Well, I guess it’s lucky I finished my coffee a minute ago.” The fading sunlight reflects off her dark red hair. Jim smiles as she helps him pick up his books. The cadet she had been walking with was forgotten when Jim replied, “Not that lucky.” Looking up at her through his eyelashes, he continues, “If you’d dropped it, I would have had to buy you another one.”

Her smile is wide as she grabs half of his books out of his arms. “Well, in that case, I think I might need some more caffeine to finish my studying tonight.”

Later, drinking her, now cold, coffee, Gaila leans against Jim’s headboard, tangled in his sheets. Jim watches avidly as she explains the engineering research she’s conducting. Her hands fly as she tries to demonstrate her ideas for the new engines being developed.

They casually meet up on most Thursdays for coffee and sex. He gives her a comfortable place to talk and she gives him the opportunity to be silent.

*

The call came when Jim was least expecting it.

“He’s going fast. It won’t be long now. He’s asking for you James.”

Jim swallowed thickly before he could speak, “ How fast can you get me there?”

“Go to the Academy’s transportation center. We can arrange to have a single-person beam ready when you get there.” The aging doctor sighed and took off his glasses. “Don’t expect a huge amount of cognitive recognition when you get here. He’s fading fast.” Jim nodded and cut off the vid-screen. He had never been more grateful to fall asleep in his clothes. He swung his feet out of the small dorm bed, and shoved them into the closest pair of shoes he found in the dark.

Jim sprinted out of the building and across the campus. The trees threw barely discernable shadows on the grassy lawns. Light flooded from the glass entrance hall of the Walker P.W. Center of Transportation. A single figure stood at the entrance, waiting for him. The worn-looking technician was almost bowled over as Jim sprinted into the building. “Which way is the pad?”

The technician turned and walked through a series of identical hallways, Jim stalking nervously behind him. When the technician stopped and opened a pair of large doors, Jim almost tripped over him. He stepped through the doors, ignoring every part of the room except the transport pad. “Ready?” the technician asked.

Jim nodded and closed his eyes as the white beams of light surrounded him. When he opened them, the sight of the familiar bulkheads of his old home almost had him wanting to close them again. A small hand slipped into his, and the end of a long red braid bumped against his shoulder.

“Come on, Jim. The others are waiting.”

Jim squeezed Amy’s hand and walked from the room with her, nodding a polite greeting to the woman operating the pad. After a minute of walking in silence, Jim said, “How bad is it?”

Amy sighed. “It’s pretty bad, Jim. Major vitals started fluxing about 30 hours ago, but they kept him stable. It was only about an hour ago that he really started to crash.” She stopped walking. The white hallway extended in both directions, guards stationed every 30 feet. “He’s been screaming about what happened, Jim. I think you should know that before you walk into the room. It’s not the kind of thing that they would think to tell you,” she said it quietly.

Jim nodded and braced his shoulders. “Alright. Is he still in the same room?” At Amy’s nod of confirmation, Jim started down the hallway. After a complex set of turns and innumerable hallways, the screaming became audible. There was a flurry of activity outside one of the rooms. They pushed through the nurses and doctors around the doorway. The young man on the bed was much too small for his age; shudders racked his small frame.

“No, NO!! Get away from me,” his hands grasped the lab coat of the nurse checking the closest machine. “Get him away from me, please,” his voice broke on the last word. Jim released Amy’s hand and crossed the room to the bed.

“Come on, bud, let go of her,” Jim gently pried the hands off of the nurse.

“Jim? Jim? He won’t let me go, help me. He won’t – ”

“He’s gone, Alex. Remember? He burned with the rest of them. None of them got out. You’re safe here. Remember?” Jim held the boy’s hand like it  
was made of glass.

“Who’s gone?” Alex said, eyes even glassier than they had been a moment ago. “Daddy? I know he’s gone. He leaves for work every morning at seven thirty. Mommy’s making pie. It’s my birthday. I’m going to be eight. Mommy’s using blueberries for the pie. I like raspberries better, but those bushes died and nothing we did could – STOP!” His head snapped around and his vitals spiked. “Don’t touch me!” he started seizing and the doctors pushed Jim away from the bed. Jim pushed back through as Alex stopped seizing. He laid quietly, limbs sprawled. “Jim?”

“Yeah, Alex?” Jim took his hand again. Alex’s eyes focused on Jim.

“Is he gone?”

“Yeah, he’s gone.”

“Really gone?”

“Yeah.”

Alex sighed. “Really gone,” he said quietly. All of the machines went crazy, protesting the reality of what had just happened in the bed. As the doctors rushed back to resuscitate him, Jim blocked them.

“Let him go,” he said, voice low and heavy.

“We have to help him!” one of the nurses shouted.

“Bringing him back wouldn’t help him. You’d be condemning him to a life spent reliving his worst nightmares. Let him be,” Jim ground out.

The attending medical staff took a step back. Amy came forward and put a hand on Jim’s back. “Come on, Jim. They won’t touch him.” She looked towards the three people standing in the corner. “Tom,” she said quietly, “can you please turn off these machines?” Tom, the burned side of his face uncovered for once, moved between the doctors and started shutting down the equipment. Once all of the machines were silent, Jim smoothed the dark, sweaty hair away from the seventeen-year-old’s forehead. “Be seeing you buddy.”

Amy took Jim’s hand and pulled him away from the bed. Tom and the other two followed. As a cohesive unit they walked through the halls to the closest room – Camille’s. Despite it being her living space for six years, Camille’s room was as spartan as it had been the day she moved into it. Jim sat on the bed with Amy and Tom, while Kevin sat in the room’s only chair. Camille went to the cabinet at the far side of the room and retrieved five glasses and a murky bottle filled halfway with a clear liquid. She splashed a bit of the liquid into each glass and gave one to each of them. They drank silently. They ignored the tears shining in Jim’s eyes, and the fact that Camille’s face was swollen from her own tears.

“I’m joining Starfleet,” Kevin announced. The other four looked at him, not a one of them surprised.

“Don’t expect me to help you with your homework,” Jim choked out.

“I’m applying for a spot in the school of engineering, so I don’t know how much of it you’d’ve been able to help me with anyway,” Kevin said. Jim snorted into his glass.

“I know a thing or two that would surprise you Mr. Riley.” Jim sighed, sniffed back his encroaching tears, and rubbed a hand across the back of his neck. “I’m gonna need to get back to the Academy. I have an exam in,” he checked the clock on the wall, “three hours.”

Camille nodded and pressed the comm button by the door. After a minute of nothing but the quiet murmur of her conversation, she said, “They’ll have the pad ready for you whenever you show up, Jim.”

Jim nodded, “I’m going to head out then.”

They put down their glasses and, again as a unit, walked to the transporter room. Jim closed his eyes against the white light, the sight of the four of them standing there burned into his memory. He opened them to the sterile Starfleet facility, the same tired-looking technician standing by the controls. He followed the man out of the building. The cold night air forced the air out of his lungs. Jim nodded his thanks and began the trek back to his dorm. The night was still dark, the only illumination coming from the lights interspersed along the paths that led from one building to another. By the time Jim reached his building, he couldn’t feel his arms, and the tears streaking down his face froze almost as fast as they fell.

His fingers shook as they punched in the code, and when he entered the heat of the building, his arms started tingling unpleasantly. He trudged up the stairs to his room. He entered it silently, collapsed onto his bed, and fell asleep.

When he woke up two hours later, it was to Bones telling him, “I’m hoping there was a damn good reason you wore my shoes to sleep.”

Jim couldn’t even summon the energy to respond, so he just shook his head, got out of bed, and began to prepare for his exam.

*

In the early spring of their third year at the Academy, Jim declares, “Bones, how do you feel about living off campus for the summer quarter? I though it was a good idea. I went ahead and signed a lease through the housing department. You can cook, right?”

Bones sighs, and doesn’t have the heart to tell Jim, that no, he can’t cook. He doesn’t think it would matter anyway; the kid looks too excited to not have freshman neighbors that come home too drunk to make it into their rooms.

Bones spends all of his non-existent free time for the rest of the quarter figuring out the basic of cooking so that they don’t starve.

Halfway through July, he returns to the apartment after a 20-hour shift at the hospital. He is greeted by dissipating clouds of smoke and the scent of charred meat. He enters the kitchen to find Jim in front of the stove, staring at a pan with fierce determination and a spatula. A plate of mostly-burnt pancake-like objects rests on the counter beside him.

“Jim, what on earth did you do?”

“Oh, hey, Bones.” Glancing at the mess on the counter, Jim continued, “Well, you always make dinner, but you have twenty hour shifts every other week, and you normally fall asleep while you cook after that, so I thought that I’d give it a try.” He frowns, “The chicken burned and I couldn’t get the pasta out of the pot, so I tried to make pancakes, because, who can screw up pancakes, right?” Bones nods, barely restraining a smile. “Well, apparently, I can screw up pancakes.” Jim smiles ruefully.

“Shove over kid, I’ll do it. You start cleaning up this mess.” Bones takes the pan over to the sink and washes it out. He rubs butter over the pan and pours a cup full of batter into it. As he waits for the small bubbles of air to form, he glances over to see Jim shoving open the window. “Jim,” Bones asks, “how exactly did you manage to get pancake batter all over your back?”

*

Her leg slid over his; a maddeningly slow slide. He gasped as he felt her against his leg. She melted down towards him, and he reached up to slip his hands around her waist and –

“Bones! Get up! You’re teaching that class in thirty minutes.”

Bones groaned and pulled his pillow over his head. “Bones, come on, you asked me to wake you up. I’m up, you need to be. Come on.” Despite the muffling effect of the pillow, Bones could hear Jim shuffling around in their bathroom as he got ready to take a shower. He took a deep breath and began listing the affects of Tiburonian influenza upon the human body. His pulse slowed as he reached swelling of the nail beds. He levered himself off of his elbows and swung his legs off the bed. He stood and stretched his arms above his head. He needed to stop dreaming about that Xenomorphic Biology major down the hall.

*

The last thing Jim expects when he walks into the room he shares with Bones is the presence of a stranger; but there she is, sprawled out on Bones’s bed, wearing the tiniest pieces of lingerie Jim has ever seen.

Upon seeing that it is Jim, and not Bones coming around the opaque barrier between the door and the room, she squeaks. She scrambles for the sheets and pulls them around her while Jim stands there, mouth open in shock.

When Bones comes into the room a minute later, the three of them look at each other for a minute before Jim grins. “So, I guess the room’s busy right now.” He claps Bones on the shoulder; “Have fun,” he mutters. At a normal volume, he continues, “I’m gonna go study at the library for an undisclosed amount of time. Don’t wait up.” He doesn’t realize until he’s outside the building that the girl was the science major who lived a couple doors down.


	3. Struck From a Great Height

When Jim found out that Gaila had access to the computers in the programming room of the Kobayashi Maru, he didn’t think twice about using that connection to destroy the test. He didn’t sleep for days as he programmed the subroutine. Bones just rolled his eyes at Jim’s nocturnal habits. He’d eventually find out what Jim was planning; wondering about it would only give him a migraine.

After the flush of success at beating the unbeatable test, Jim went to Gaila’s, and apparently Uhura’s, room. When no one answered the obnoxious beeping ring programmed as the doorbell, he assumed that no one was home. The next day, sitting in the large hall, he was genuinely surprised that Gaila had her long green limbs wrapped around each other. From the way her mouth was tightened at the corners, he could tell that the only thing keeping her from frowning was the presence of the many admirals sitting before them. He noted the glimmer of satisfaction in her eye when Admiral Barnett called his name. Glancing at Bones, Jim walked down to the podium. The stuffy, pointy-eared officer announced the accusations against him.

Jim hadn’t anticipated that Gaila would actually be this upset with him.

*

Staring at the carnage and debris floating in the space above Vulcan, Jim has a flash of panicked remembrance. Fields of smoke and dust and fire, littered with the bodies of the dead flicker before his eyes. He thinks of the diverse faces that made up his class at the academy. He can’t remember which ship Gaila was assigned to. Jim shakes his head and begins to focus and prepare to do whatever he can to fix anything that is put in his way.

*

When he goes for the jugular and yells, “YOU NEVER LOVED HER!” in Spock’s face, he feels a momentary thrill of satisfaction. The anger and helplessness that coursed through him when Spock threw his father’s death at him, in front of the student body, is now echoed in each animalistic sound that escapes Spock’s mouth. This satisfaction is instantly replaced with shame. Jim can’t even bring himself to continue fighting. There are some insults that just go too far.

*

Hearing Spock hypothesize about alternate universes was one thing. Seeing the living, breathing proof that his life was supposed to be different was another thing entirely. Hearing this older version of Spock speak about George Kirk wasn’t nearly as painful as the fact the Jim simply didn’t have the courage to ask about Tarsus IV. He couldn’t bear the thought that somewhere, some when, he might never have stepped foot on that dying world.

*

After the ship blasts away from the empty space where the Narada used to be and everyone on the ship has been treated for their injuries, Bones drags himself through the halls to his quarters. Unsurprisingly, Acting Captain Jim Kirk is curled up on Bones’s bed. Taking in the massive amount of contusions on Jim’s head, neck, and hands, Bones is almost afraid to see what marks his torso bears. Setting down the bag full of medication and assorted tools, which he brought for precisely this reason, Bones sits on the edge of his bed. Jim, who’s always been a light sleeper, opens his slightly swollen eyes.

“’S everybody okay?”

“Yeah, Jim, everyone’s gonna be fine.” Bones replies. “Everyone except you, that is. Come on wake up. I need to see how close to death you came this time.”

“”S fine Bones, I’ve had worse.”

“Really Jim, where,” Bones says, just trying to keep Jim awake.

“Ts fr, where else Bones,” Jim mumbles.

“What?”

At the quiet horror in Bones’ voice, Jim’s eyes shoot open, “Ah, fuck,” he says.

“Jim, tell me you didn’t just say what I think you did.”

Jim put his head in his hands, resting his elbows on his knees.

“So I take it you didn’t meet Amy at a diner where she was a waitress?”

“No Bones, I didn’t. We lived together at a military base in Oklahoma for three years,” Jim says into his hands. “Look Bones, I’m barely conscious and stringing a sentence together is the hardest thing in the world to do at the moment, so could we not dig out dirty laundry right now?”

Bones nodded wearily. “Alright, Jim. Not right now. Come on, shirt off. Let me see how much damage you’ve sustained in the last few days.”

Bones’s pulse pounds in his ears as Jim pulls off his shirt, revealing a wide range of colors and lacerations. He was a doctor, not a psychologist, and he had no idea how to handle this information. This was beyond anything he could help Jim with. He curses himself for not seeing it sooner. As he deftly smoothes the dermal regenerator over Jim’s three fractured ribs, the bruises disappear, making the old scars obvious. He shudders internally; he knows enough about what happened on Tarsus IV that he now has mental images to go with each one. Bones takes a deep breath to shake his rising nausea. With another gasp of air, Bones cracks his neck and settles down to do what he can to ease his friend’s pain.

*

Bones is woken by a persistent and highly unpleasant beeping originating from somewhere around his right ear. Jim is sprawled in the half of the bed allotted to him, and blearily opens his eyes as Bones shifts to answer the communicator.

“What do you want,” Bones growls out.

“Sorry to disturb you Mr. McCoy, but I’m trying to locate the Captain. There’s a transmission for him…it’s,” Sulu pauses, looking supremely uncomfortable. “She says she’s been trying to contact him for almost two days.”

“Who is it?” Jim asks, voice still thick with sleep.

“It’s your mother.”

Jim looks dumbfounded for a second then chokes out a laugh. “Well, by all means, patch her through. Wouldn’t want her to work herself up, now would we?” Sulu nods and disappears from the screen.

“Jim, I – ” Bones begins, but is interrupted as the vid-screen bursts into life.

“Jimmy? Are you there?”

Bones quickly moves out of the screen’s view.

“What d’ya want Mom?” Jim says to the blonde woman on the screen, false cheer in his voice.

“I heard – that is, I was informed…are you all right?” concern covers her face, but the only thing Bones is aware of is the spark of rage that flares up in Jim’s eyes.

“Fit as a fiddle, Mom. Never been better. Anything else you need?” there is a tightness around his eyes that betrays the words coming easily off his tongue.

“No,” she says quietly. She pauses for a moment then continues, “Jimmy, I – ”

“Sorry Mom, gotta go. Ship won’t run itself,” Jim cuts her off.

“Right, of course. Jimmy, I – ”

“Bye Mom.” James cuts off the connection and any hint of bravado leaves his frame. Bones slowly moves towards the bed. Hearing his approach, Jim’s head pops up, and he leverages himself into a standing position. Cracking his back, he says to Bones, “Time for a shower. Lots to do today.”

As Jim walks to the shower, movements still a little stiff, Bones sits back on the bed. That was not quite the reunion he had anticipated.

*

As the Enterprise limps back to Earth at a snail’s pace, Jim is constantly in motion. Whether he’s helping the engineering department jerry-rig a functioning engine, making sure that Chekov eats at least twice a day, or just keeping everyone so busy that they cannot dwell on the events of the   
past week, Jim is never at rest.

It takes Bones four days to wonder how odd it is that Jim never seems to be in the mess hall, and an additional day for him to confirm his suspicions.

When he enters his quarters on the night of the fifth day, Bones is ready for a confrontation. Jim is sitting on the single bed in a loose pair of Bones’ pants with a towel covering his head.

“You haven’t eaten in almost a week, Jim,” Bones says softly.

“What,” Jim looks out from under the towel, his eyes red and bleary. “That can’t be right, I had a really big lunch right before the…oh,” his head and shoulders droop even more. “Right before the disciplinary trial. Fuck!”

“You didn’t notice?” Bones asked.

“No, Bones I didn’t, alright,” Jim sighs and starts to stand up.

Bones stops him with a hand on each shoulder. “Jim,” he begins, “your body has been under an intense amount of strain. If you go and eat as much as I’ve seen you tuck away, you’ll only hurt yourself.” Bones crouches down in front of Jim. “I’ll go and get you something from the mess hall that I know you can keep down. You’re going to lie down and relax for a change.”

As Bones heads for the door, he is stopped by Jim’s quiet, “You didn’t ask me how.” At Bones’s questioning look, he continues, “You didn’t ask me how I’ve gone so long without eating.”

“Honestly, Jim, at this point, I know that if you want to tell me something, you’ll tell me in your own sweet time. Back in a few.”

When Bones returns bearing a tray with an apple, some cheese, and a bit of stale bread, Jim is sitting cross-legged on the bed. “Three weeks,” Jim says as Bones places the tray on the bed. “I can go three weeks without noticing that I’m hungry. I can go without food for longer, but I don’t notice it for three weeks.” He takes a bite of the apple and Bones sits next to him on the bed before he continues. “It was more important for my cousins to eat. They didn’t understand that there was nothing left, or that their parents weren’t going to come home bearing dinner like they used to.” He cleared his throat, “The replicators make decent apples even without the parts engineering’s taken.”

Momentarily allowing the change of subject, Bones responded, “Yup, but everyone keeps complaining about stale bread.” Bones raised his eyebrow, “The fact that one of the only edible things coming out of the replicators right now is stale bread doesn’t have anything to do with you, now does it Jim?”

“Maybe a little bit,” Jim said, taking a large bite of the hard bread, “but it doesn’t hurt anyone, so, I think a little creature comfort for the Acting Captain isn’t such a terrible thing.”

Bones chuckled a bit before sobering. “Seriously though, Jim, I know that you didn’t mean to tell me what you did the other night, and I know that the government would never have allowed you in with the general public if you hadn’t been cleared by countless doctors, but this is just me and you. I am first and foremost your friend, but if you ever need something, medically, I hope that you would come to me first.”

Jim laughed mirthlessly, “Bones, you’re the first doctor that I’ve allowed within ten feet of me without being sedated since that fucking hospital.” Bones grimaces internally, he remembers the story that Amy told their Academy class.

“Okay then,” Bones says, clearing his throat. “Finish that up while I shower.” As he heads for the small, attached bathroom, he calls back, “And I don’t want any crumbs on the sheets, you’ll attract some form of weird space ant.”

Hearing Jim’s snort of amusement, Bones smiles slightly. ‘Everything will be alright,’ he thinks, ‘eventually, everything will be alright.’

*

When the Enterprise finally makes it back to Earth, with the help of some of the ships from the main fleet and Scotty’s technological genius, Jim is shocked by the sheer amount of people that are gathered to greet them. Most of the crowds are kept away from the shuttle hanger as the Enterprise’s crew is flown in from the space station; the ground crew is sent instructions to only let through those approved by a member of the crew. Jim is justifiably surprised when he steps off the shuttle and is almost tackled by a small figure. Red hair obscures his vision and his ribs are held in a vice-like grip.

“Amy, I can’t breath,” Jim chokes out.

She pulls away, eyes shining, but cheeks stubbornly dry. “James T. Kirk, I aught to bash you over the head, but I have never been more proud to know you, you idiot!” She grins widely and hugs him again. Jim tentatively wraps his arms around her for the first time since he met her.

*

Jim is helping Scotty reconnect some sort of communications line, flat on his back with his arms deep in a tangle of wires and mechanical parts, when he just about slices his left hand off. Through the blood and the panic of the surrounding engineers, all Jim can hear is, “Not near the rotator circuits!!” in Scotty’s thick accent. He is half escorted, half carried through the halls to the Med Bay. Bones is unsurprised at the blood dripping from beneath the shirt tied around his wrist, but his face pales slightly at the sight of Jim’s dangling hand. Bones is efficient as he slows blood flow, injects Jim with a dosage of painkillers that’s slightly too high, and sets to work reconnecting bones and tissues and nerves.

The second the skin is closed over the wrist, Jim tries to hop off the biobed, only to find Bones’s hand planted firmly in the middle of his chest. “Not for another two hours, Jim. With that level of anesthetic in you, you’re not touching another part of this ship. You’ll come back with only one leg.”

Jim scoffs at him, but lays back down, shoulders tight. “I know you don’t like it, Jim, but it’s just two hours,” Bones says quietly. Bones brings a chair over to the bed and sits. As the minutes tick by, Jim’s shoulders slowly relax. Half an hour into Bones’s allotted time, Jim is soundly sleeping.

*

“Captain, what is the origin of those numbers? They seem familiar somehow, yet their sequence is highly illogical,” Spock’s question is innocent, a curious passing remark during their weekly chess games. Bones, sitting in the corner observing, notes the slight tension that immediately grips Jim’s frame.

“Jim, Spock. We’re off duty, call me Jim.” Glancing at the tattoo on his arm, Jim gives a noncommittal shrug. “I honestly don’t know Spock. I think I was pretty drunk when I got it. Who knows, maybe it was the tattooist’s idea of a joke.” Spock raises an eyebrow, clearly unconvinced, but doesn’t comment further. Bones tries to return to his book, but instead finds himself fixed upon Spock’s question. 2445, 3,000, 12, 5…, 2445, 3,000, 12, 5…, 2445, 3,000, 12, 5…

Bones’s eyes cannot hold up the pretense that he’s reading anymore. ‘Eliminate the first one and you have…’ His thought trailed off as he finally put it together. 3,000 initial survivors, 12 retrieved from the planet, 5 left sane. The 2445 must have been Jim’s personal number. Bones glances up from the worn pages to watch the play of muscle under the tattoo as Jim uses his hands to demonstrate something for Spock. It was so typically Jim; putting his biggest secret right on display and having no one catch him. Bones shook his head ruefully, and resumed his reading as Jim and Spock bickered genially over the game.

*

The bridge crew can hear the shouting from three floors away, growing louder as the turbolift draws closer. The doors open to reveal an almost fuming McCoy, and a surprisingly calm Kirk.

“Jim, don’t think I don’t know how you feel about doctors, but if you insist upon running around every goddamn alien planet we come across, I will be giving you regular physicals to make sure that the next time you’re running from some random monster, your heart doesn’t give out. Do you have any idea how much paperwork has to be filled out if you die?”

“Okay.”

“Because if you think I’m going to spend all that time – wait, what?”

“I said okay, Bones. I’m not some unreasonable child,” Jim paused (ignoring Bones’ muttered, “Could’ve fooled me.”). “Besides, if you were going to kill me, you would’ve done it while I was too drunk to resist.”

*

“Guess your mom did the right thing then, sending you to Tarsus IV. Really learned some good shit there, huh?”

Jim froze as the hated voice of his once-step-father halted the movement around him. He was paralyzed. He had also never been happier to be on leave and away from his crew. The bartender made a small gesture towards the door. Two impossibly large men peeled themselves away from the shadows of the bar. Jim gripped his glass of beer so hard he was sure it would shatter. He tilted his head to see the pudgy, balding figure behind him. The two large men flanked the swaying figure of Frank.

“Get him out of here,” the bartender said quietly. The bouncers each grabbed one of Frank’s arms and hauled him out of the club. “People say the damndest things when they’re drunk,” the bartender said, inviting the bar’s patron’s to laugh with him. Jim couldn’t do anything but drag his eyes back around to the sticky bar top. The bartender gave him a fresh beer. “On the house, Captain. And anything else you need. It’s dark enough in here that no one will know for sure that you’re actually you.” The bartender cleared his throat and looked straight into Jim’s eyes, “My sister lives in San Francisco. She would’ve been one of the first to go. Whatever may or may not have been said tonight by a stupid drunk doesn’t leave that barstool.” Jim forced out a little smile, and cradled his beer between his hands.


End file.
